Source :- PERTH NOW NEWS
More than 225 athletes who were abused at the Australian Institute of Sport have been paid more than $3 million in restoration.
Officials are preparing to close the sorry chapter in Australian sport, ending the four-year restoration program for AIS scholarship holders.
About 225 AIS athletes have been paid between $5000 and $50,000 each, and more than $3 million collectively, ahead of the Australian Sports Commission (ASC) stopping the four-year program at the end of the year.
“I don’t think that any amount of money restores people from the trauma that they have experienced,” ASC chief executive Kieren Perkins told AAP.
The ASC in 2022 formally apologised to AIS scholarship holders subjected to abuse at the nation’s sporting hub in Canberra.
Perkins said the money was considered only one component to the restoration program, which most importantly gave ex-athletes a voice.
“Hearing that the organisation absolutely is sorry for what occurred and acknowledges it was unacceptable – and it wasn’t their (the athletes’) fault, because they were children at the time – it’s extremely powerful and worthwhile,” Perkins said.
“Everyone who has been involved with the restorative engagement program, their first priority, by a mile, is wanting to know that their experience isn’t happening to athletes today.
“They often feel guilty that they didn’t do enough to bring forward their stories … that maybe because they didn’t act back in the day, this is perpetuated on to other people.
“It’s an understandable feeling, but it’s absolutely not right.”
Perkins said the restorative program, which covered scholarship holders between 1981 and 2013 and also included counselling, would continue to influence current practices.
“When someone comes to you with a complaint and a need to share their story, the worst thing you can do is turn it into a defensive, legal, combative attempt to hide or protect image, in inverted commas,” he said.
“Instead of actually acknowledging and addressing the human being who is in front of you.”
Perkins’ comments came as the ASC released a survey showing generally positive wellbeing in Australian sport.
A survey of 1300 people from 43 sports found 71 per cent were “thriving”, according to the National Wellbeing Survey.
Some 24 per cent of respondents were in the “surviving” range, and 4.9 per cent in the “struggling” range.
Para athletes and people with disability showed lower or more variable experiences in several environments.
And First Nations respondents reported a broader spread of experiences, suggesting outcomes may be strongly shaped by the presence or absence of culturally safe and supportive environments.
“There’s still heaps of work to do,” Perkins said.
“At scale, things are a lot better.
“What the wellbeing survey does highlight to us is there’s a good system there, but we won’t let our foot off the gas, we need to embed it deeper in community sport environments.”
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